Girltelligence: A safe and supportive social community app for teen girls and young women

Abstract

Young people’s mental health has deteriorated over the last decade, especially among females. Rates of depression, anxiety, and self-harm have soared while well-being has declined. This mental health crisis has coincided with increased use of smartphones and social media, the extended isolation and suffering caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, and attacks on reproductive rights. These recent stressors have compounded the historic challenges women and girls have always faced while growing up, at school, in society, and in the workplace. In this paper, we examine the mental health effects of social media on young people, focusing on females. In an effort to address the current crisis, we designed a mobile app, Girltelligence, that provides a safe online space for girls and young women to advise and support one another on any topics without judgment and without the negative mental health impacts associated with mainstream social media. Girltelligence achieves this by offering a safe environment monitored by both AI and human moderators and tailored by age.